Road trip food: what to bring
Spending the whole day in the car on the way to a sunny holiday destination is wonderful, but it can also be tiring. How do you make it extra enjoyable? Exactly: bring lots of delicious food. Here are FavorFlav’s tips for a perfectly balanced car journey.
Food and drinks along the motorway are far too expensive and often not very tasty (with one exception). So you’re better off having a car full of delicious things. Let’s assume you leave very early in the morning and arrive around 8 p.m. Maybe your journey is shorter, in which case you can skip a few steps—no problem.
It’s not rocket science, but with packing stress and holiday nerves, you may well overlook something. In any case, remember that the driver will also get hungry while driving. Make sure everything can be eaten with one hand, so driving and eating are manageable.
Sandwiches
If you set off in the early morning light, you may not be willing to get up even earlier to have breakfast as well. Making sandwiches the night before gives you the chance to turn over and go back to sleep when the alarm goes off.
Three sandwiches should get you through the day. Start with a mild option; in the morning, you probably won’t feel like tuna salad or spicy sausage yet. A cheese sandwich will do, albeit with one of these upgrades.
Other favourites include French or Italian salami with Amora mayonnaise and tomato, or homemade mackerel rillettes. In any case, don’t add things that easily fall out of the sandwich—that makes a mess. If you really want to take your time, this bahn mi sandwich from Vietnam is also an absolute hit.
Snacks
Sandwiches are great for a bigger appetite, but sometimes you simply feel like nibbling. It’s important to have enough sweet and savoury things, so you can alternate.
Savoury
Crisps, obviously—that’s a no brainer. Nuts and any other favourite supermarket snacks: pack them all. Other savoury snacks that are easy to eat include lemper (Indonesian rice filled with chicken, fish or meat, which you can simply get at the Asian supermarket), samosas and cold pizza from the day before.
Sweet
Hopefully you have air conditioning for when you’re driving through high temperatures. But things don’t stay chilled in the car forever. So it’s better to leave sweets with a high melting point (read: chocolate) at home. Better ideas: biscuits, homemade muffins or cupcakes, cake or banana bread that you slice in advance. Sweets also survive very well, and as soon as you cross the French border, be sure to buy a large bag of madeleines. Or two.
Lunch
Are you really driving from early morning until late at night? Then it’s important to take a proper break. In that case, we recommend not packing anything for lunch, but making the most of it in a nice town along the way. Check in advance which town you’ll reach around lunchtime and choose a good restaurant there. Afterwards, you can continue on with a full stomach and stretched legs.
Water
We can keep this one short. Bring enough water; it’s good for you.
Read also:
- No more soggy sandwiches
- The most Instagrammable places in the country
- These are the 50 best sandwiches in Europe
